The Thinning Of The Veil
Posted: 02 November 2019
Word Count: 145
Summary: For this week's prompt. Couldn't let Halloween go by without entering :-)
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I wonder if you know about
the thinning of the veil?
Some say it’s just for Halloween,
a ghostly, Old Wives’ Tale.
I hope it is a place to meet
between your world and mine.
For me, to be a child again.
A chance to turn back time.
I may have missed you touch my hair
and tuck my quilt in tight.
Perhaps you just peeked through the door
to whisper “Love, goodnight”.
If you could come back once a year
I know you wouldn’t fail.
So, I wonder if you know
about the thinning of the veil?
A meeting place of memory
where love will always flow.
I fell asleep and waited but
I guess you didn’t know.
I pray that I will hear you
whisper to me once again.
The veil will thin once more next year
so I can wait ‘til then.
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Comments by other Members
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 michwo at 00:47 on 03 November 2019
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Thanks for commenting on "Dead in the Water", Jo-Ann.
The least I can do in return is comment on your Halloween poem too.
This is a lovely poem and not at all maudlin, which quite a lot of my poems would be if I were able to write them.
I think, on the strength of this, you might like something like "The Habit of Perfection" by Gerard Manley Hopkins, a poem written when he was 22 (I know we're both older - I'm 70 now, God help me!) on the brink of becoming a priest and a monk, so there was something spiritual and noble in his aspirations too. If you have something of the Celtic twilight in you you tend to attach importance to things like Samhain, the end of Harvest-time and the start of the dark time of the year, which is celebrated on October 31st and legend has it that it's easy to talk to the dead that day. Is there something of this in your poem? There is, but it's good and life-enhancing. 'One must speak for life and growth amid all this mass of destruction and disintegration.' D. H. Lawrence wrote that long before Brexit and Islamic State had been thought of... Sorry. I know I'm supposed to comment on your actual poem. These are just the associations of ideas they give rise to in me. Your poem, for me, and I honestly like it for that, reads like classic ballad metre, very smoothly and regularly - 8, 6, 8, 6, 8, 6...(these numbers are referring to syllables by the way or metrical feet, di-dum, di-dum, di-dum, etc., if you will, and with you they're not contrived but natural). Because I personally think you should keep this pattern if possible, I'd rephrase the last two lines of your second stanza to read: I wonder then if you know too/ The thinning of the veil? If this poem was longer that regular beat would get monotonous, I know, but you've done something in the last stanza that shows, I think, a good ear on your part to introduce, if only for the space of two lines, a variation. I pray that I will hear you/ whisper to me once again... are heptasyllables, i.e. seven syllable lines, and they're just right to prepare the last 8, 6 as the finale to your poem. I think you're very gifted to be able to do this. Well done. Just one slight quibble in the very last line, even though you sense it as a shortened form of until, I think that till would be better than 'til.
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 FelixBenson at 09:52 on 03 November 2019
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Love this, Jo. We want the circle to close again, and so the rhymes fit with this too. Rhymes say closure to me in this one. And the poem is a plea for closure. Beautifully put together. Lots of love pouring through this poem. You make it look easy, but I know it isn't.
You've captured what we all want to be true. x
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 Practicer at 10:32 on 03 November 2019
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There is a deep echo resonatining through this poem. Very descriptive.
Reading it stokes the flames of the tradition of halloween.
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 V`yonne at 14:21 on 03 November 2019
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I love this. I want to repeat the first verse at the end and sing the whole thing to some old irish tune. I had one running through my head all the way through! It would be popul;ar, I'm sure. Do you have a guitar? Can you sing?
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FelixBenson at 19:22 on 03 November 2019
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I see what you mean about the song, Oonah - I am singing it now too. I can hear it so clearly - a new folk song! Well done Jo. You should get this one out there!
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 Jojovits1 at 20:58 on 03 November 2019
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Thank you all. The first anniversary of my mum passing is next week (also my wedding aniversary, ta mumsy!)
Oonah, you had this bang on as lyrics were exactly what I was thinking about when I wrote this.
I miss her.
xxx
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V`yonne at 23:08 on 03 November 2019
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Oh that's a difficult week for you, Jo. Sending good wishes and vibes galore. Sing it for her while the veil is thin xxx
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.JPG) LA at 22:33 on 09 November 2019
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Jo, this is so beautiful. It flows so effortlessly and yet it would have taken a great deal of skill to write it. It pours out from the heart; I hope it brings you peace at this difficult time. And yes, it lends itself perfectly to being sung.
Lesley 
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Cliff Hanger
